The second episode of season four didn't fare as well as the premiere, which also didn't have great ratings (vs. the whole cable universe, not the SciFi channel, mind you). The second episode lost about 16% of its viewers from the premiere falling to 1.801 million viewers (from 2.138 million for the premiere). I predict it will lose more, perhaps even me for the time being, although I'm sure I'll go back and binge on them when it winds up completing.

Before getting to the spoilers here are the first two episodes ratings in their debut airings. We don't even get the first Friday airings via Nielsen because they don't make the weekly cable top 40. I'd rate our odds of ever seeing any of the data for the subsequent airings as very, very close to zero..

Date

Episode

HH Rating/Share

Viewers (millions)

18-49 Rating/Share

04/04/2008

He That Believeth in Me

1.3/2

2.138

1.1/3

04/11/2008

Six of One

1.1/2

1.801

0.9/3

04/18/2008

The Ties That Bind

1.1/2

1.741

0.8/3

Spoilers below...Whatever promise the season four premiere held, some of it waned for me in the second episode. It seems likely they will drag out going back to earth until pretty much the finale and I think I may just be at the "all right, already just go to earth, sheesh!" point. Maybe I just didn't like Number 6 (Tricia Helfer) with darker hair. Uh, no. She could dye her hair lime green and I'd still love her.

To be fair, last year there were episodes aplenty that were completely uninteresting to me. That was not the case with "Six of One".

The episode had a few things I did enjoy but they probably amounted to about 10 minutes of viewing. I enjoyed Starbuck pulling a gun on the madam President, but that scene went a little (ok, way too) long. I enjoyed Starbuck calling Admiral Adama the gutless coward that he was and I enjoyed that it seemed to have motivated him to not be such a gutless coward. I also enjoyed the Natalie model of #6 demanding that Cavil (model #1) stop the the "raider lobotomies" and I especially enjoyed her calling in two Centurions (after having removed their "higher brain inhibitors" and seeing all the other human Cylons (besides Natalie) gunned down by them.

So far, the story line around the newly found out four human Cylons, including Tory getting naked with Baltar (and crying during sex) is completely uninteresting to me. Still, Baltar's line that human's may have created the cylons but it was the "one true God" who gave them souls will surely be revisited.

If there is a Starbuck "what life on a sewage ship is like" episode -- so don't want to watch that. Which probably ensures that there will be at least two...

Am I being too harsh? Or will another 337,000 bail out on this week's episode. I'm guessing it will have fewer viewers than Six of One, but only by 150K-200K or about 1.6-1.65 million viewers. What do you think?